Pages

Sunday, 24 April 2011

confetti, confectionary and anti-consumerism

I've never really celebrated Easter before. Before kids it was just another chocolate based long weekend. We were remniscing today ﻿about Easter 2008. I was recovering from surgery, D had just quit his job so we could go travelling. We bought leftover eggs from a corner shop and played Mario Kart for four days.

I'm still a handmade punk at heart though. And I felt truly rebellious using The Financial Times to make cascarones.

It wasn't entirely an act of anti-capitalism though. I just love the natural peachy colour that looks so good with my white china and subtle palette.

I love the idea of plants instead of flowers on the table, plus I've had a packet of cress seeds tucked in the back of a notebook forever. I just washed out the shells and allowed them to air dry, popped a damp cotton wool ball in the bottom and sprinkled in some seeds. I was hoping they'd grow super long and I could draw faces on the eggs and cut crazy hairstyles like the Play-Dough Barber Shop. But it was not to be.

I made these message eggs too - let me tell you trying to get the egg out of this little hole was not easy. I later read you should make a smaller hole in the top and blow the contents out, but I never do things the easy way. There are no shots of these message eggs in action, because I filled them with ultrafine glitter and instantly regretted it. Little Vin had glitter in his eyelashes.

See, I'm not really a fan of the Hot Cross Bun, so I made a sugar cookie with a little cinnamon and orange zest, rolled them into balls and dotted with currants and and icing cross. I love playing a little with tradition, and I really loved these cookies.

Oh, and the cascarones. I haven't used papier mache since I was at infant school and it was so much fun. Sticky fingers and endless possibilities right? (yes, we had a Blue Peter Tracey Island). I think they made the eggs a little tough to smash though. See...

That is one hundred percent toddler effort right there. He did it though, and loved them. A whole evening with a hole punch and a whole lot of sweeping up later, but so worth it.

Cascarones are a Mexican treat, like a mini pinata and they're meant for smashing over heads (don't worry, it is supposed to bring luck!) They're doing the rounds on the blogs right now. Jordan Ferney posted a fun game here﻿.